"Don't be an ass!" begged Jackson. "They'll eat you." Herrick
waved
his hand reassuringly.
"They won't even see me," he explained. "I can find my way about
this place better than they can. And I'll keep to windward of
them,
and watch them. Go to the house," he commanded. "I'll be with you
in an hour, and report."
It was with real relief that, on assembling for dinner, the house
party found Herrick, in high spirits, with the usual number of
limbs, and awaiting them. The experiment had proved a great
success. He told how, unheeded by the bears, he had, without
difficulty, followed in their tracks. For an hour he had watched
them. No happy school-children, let loose at recess, could have
embraced their freedom with more obvious delight. They drank from
the running streams, for honey they explored the hollow
tree-trunks, they sharpened their claws on moss-grown rocks, and
among the fallen oak leaves scratched violently for acorns. So
satisfied was Herrick with what he had seen, with the success of
his experiment, and so genuine and unselfish was he in the
thought
of the happiness he had brought to the beasts of the forests,
that
for him no dinner ever passed more pleasantly.
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